Illuminated sign.



J. GQWILLIAMS. ILLUMINATED SIGN.

APPLICATION FILED MAY 20.1914.

Patented Sept. 17, 1918.

2 SHEETS-SHEET muwwoz G. Williams -.I. G. WILLIAMS.

ILLUMINATED SIGN.

APPLICATION FILED MAY 20. 1914.

1,279,197. PatentedSept. 17,1918.

2 SHEETS-SHEET 2.

aiz 5 I vvuemboz TE STATES PATENT OFFICE.

JOSEPH G. WILLIAMS, OF NEW YORK, Y., ASSIGNOR, BY DIRECT AND MESN E ASSIGN- MEN TS, TO THE CURRENT-SAVING ELECTRIC SIGN COMPANY, INC., OF NEW YORK,

N. Y A CORPORATION or NEW YORK.

' ILLUMINATED SIGN.

- Specification of Letters Patent. 7 Patented Sept. 17, 1918.

Application filed May 20, 1914. Serial No. 839,820.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, JOSEPH G. WILLIAMS,

a citizen of the U. S. of America, residing at New York, in the county of'New York and State of New York, have invented new and useful Improvements in Illuminated Signs, of which the following is a specification.

This invention relates to that class of signs having characters so constructed as to be visible in daylight to the eye, and further constructed to support a number of incandescent lamps arranged in position to illuminate the characters of a sign and be visible therewith at night. I This type of sign is commonly termed a live light sign by reason of the fact that the incandescent lamps are visible with the characters which they illuminate.

Illuminated signs as at present constructed have characters of the sunken trough, or the extension trough type, or characters of the flush type. In live light signs provided with the sunken or the extension trough characters it has heretoforebeen the practice to arrange the incendescent lamps so as.

to extend outwardly from the sign or. in directions at right angles to the bottom or back surface of the characters. In instances where the sign had characters on its opposite faces or conformed to what is generally known as a double faced sign the arrangement of attaching the incandescent lamps to the bottoms or backs of the characters made necessary the employment of a separate bank or battery of lamps for each of the-characters on the opposite -faces of the sign. This was made necessary by reason of the fact that the said bottomsorbacks of the characters were formed of metal or other analogous material impervious to the action of light. faced sign the above stated arrangement of the lamps made the cost of upkeep of such sign, by reason of the great amount of current needed forthe lamps, equal to twice that required. with a sign having characters on one face only. This, of course, does not take into consideration the item of upkeep incidental to the replacing'of burned-out lamps nor the initial cost of the-sign. It will be further observed that with the arrangement of lamps in a trough character as previously pointed out, but a comparatively Thus it is obvious that in a doublev cent filament, while the light from the long sides of the filament is directed onto the surrounding side walls of the trough characters and is then reflected outwardly by the surfaces of these side walls wliichare invariably paintedwhite or with a light color.

Now from the foregoing it will be obvious that ample room exists for improvement in the arrangement of the illuminating agents in a single or'double faced live'light sign, and for improvements tending to reduce the initial cost'an'd the cost of maintenance of a double faced live light sign.

With this in View the general object of the present invention is to obtain niaximum illuminating efiiciency' from the incandescent lamps of a live light sign of single or of double faced construction, andto effect the illumination of the registering portions of opposite characters in a double faced sign simultaneously with ,a single battery or bank of incandescent lamps.

And to these ends the invention resides in incorporating in the frame or casing of a sign a translucent reflecting plate provided at chosen intervals with transparent'openings arranged in such relation as to define a required character or characters, arranging incandescent lamps in alinement with the light openings of the plate and further in so arranging the said lamps that lines drawn from their tips to their bases will be in planes parallel with the surface of the plate.

Other objects will appear and be better understood from that embodiment of my invention of which the following is a specification reference being had to the accompanying drawings forming part hereof, in which:

Figure 1 is a view in front elevation of a sign constructed in accordance with the Fig. 6 is a rear elevation of a modified construction of sign.

Fig. 7 1s a view 1n edge elevatlon thereof.

"In Figs. 1 to 5 inclusive, I have shown the invention used in connection with a sign one of whose sides'is comprised of sunken'characters and the other of whose sides is made up of extension characters. In Figs. 6 and :7 the invention is; shown in connection with a sign one of whose sides consists of sunken j characters and the other of whose sides consists of flush characters. At the outset it may be stated that this showing is simply illustrative, and from what will hereinafter appear it can be readily seen how my inven tion may be applied to a sign, the characters lamps. In the present instance this backon one side of which conform in construction to those on the other, or in whlch combinations of constructions dlflerent from those shown, are used. In Figs. 1 to 5 inclusive, 1

indicates generally the body of the sign which may be of the usual or any approved construction. What will subsequently be termed the opposite faces of this body,-are

indicated respectively, by 2 and 3. The face 2 is herein shown as being provided with a series of characters. of the sunken type, and

the side 3 carries a series of characters of the stance and to provide the said wall with the usual electric sockets for the incandescent ground or bottom wall which is indicated by the numeral 5, forms a bottom common to opposite characters on faces Qand 3, and-is constructed so as to permitthe light of the lamps to illuminate simultaneously registering parts of the a-linin-g characters on opposite faces of the sign. In appearance this wall is arelatively thinplate, a portion or portions of which are so constructed as to permit the passage therethrough of light.

These light transmitting portions are' arranged suitable distances apart and when the plate is arranged in the body of a double faced sign, the said light transmitting portions will be in alinement with the registering portions of opposite alining characters,

so that an incandescent lamp arran ed so as to extend parallel with the surface 0 one face ofthe plate, and further, arranged in alinement, with the-light transmitting portions,

will be visible from either face of the sign. Now in so far as the principle of the present invention is concerned, it is immaterial as to the substance of which the plate is formed or as to the color of the plate, since the underlying principle of that part of the invention now under discussion, resides in illuminating the registering portions of alining characters of a double faced live light sign,

simultaneously. A preferred construction of plate isshown in the drawings. In this case the plate is formed of glass ground or otherwise suitably treated so as to render it translucent and provided at chosen intervals with transparent portions 10. It will be noted by reference to Figs. 3 and 6 that the transparent portions 10 are arranged so as to define the characters which go to make up the term of the sign. With this construction and when the lamps are placed in alinement with the transparent portions 10, the effect had on viewing the character on the side 3 of the sign is the same as in observing a character 0 approximately twice the depth of the character on side 3, and in the instance of a flush character as shown inFig. 6, the effect is to give this flush character the semblance of a sunken or trough character. This illusion is undoubtedly dueto the light rays coming through the transparent portions 10, being of greater intensity than those coming through the translucent parts of the bottom plate 5 which intervene and surround the transparent portions.

The remaining featureof novelty in my invention resides in the disposition of the lamps 8. Referring now to the drawings it will be observed that the sockets 7 forthese lamps are arranged on the side walls of the troughs rather than on the bottom plate or tice .and' as hereinbefore mentioned. The

sockets are connected in the usual mannerto the feed wires9 which are in turn connected 1n the usual manner with a source of electric energy. By so disposing the socketsit will be observed that whenthe bulbs or lamps 8 are attached thereto in the ordinary manner, the said bulbs will be parallel, or

substantially so, with the adjacent surface of reflecting plate 5 so that when thefilaments in the bulbs arein an incandescent state, the major volume of the light willissue directly outward from the character rather than indirectly or by reflection, as is the case when the transparent portions 10 are arranged in such relation as to aline one with theother,

so that bulbs arranged in the trough-on side 2 will be visible from'side 3 through the transparent portions 10.

background, as has heretofore been the practhe direction of extension of the filaments is In instances where the same term as had on I the opposite sides of a sign and the outlines or. opposite characters of such term register one with the other as would be the case of the sign having on opposite faces the term shown in-Fig. 6, then a single bank or bat- I tery of lamps is all that is necessary to illuminate any two opposite characters. In instances where characters whose outlines do not register when superimposed one upon the other, are arranged opposite to each other to make up for instance, the term shown on the opposite sides of the sign in Figs. 1 to 5, then additional lamps must be employed in those characters which depend in part on the light coming through the transparent or translucent portions 10, for their illumination. In such instances as will be observed by referring to Figs. 1 and 3, separate sets of lamps are employed to illuminate those portions of the characters on side 3 which do not register or alinc with any part of opposite characters on side 2. In carrying out this arrangement the lamps are disposed in the body 1, and arranged as shown by dotted lines in Fig. 1 and between the background or reflecting plate 5 and the side-2. In this instance it will, of course, be understood that suitable supports are provided for the lamp sockets and that transparent portions 10 will be had in the plate 5 and in alinement with these sets oflamps. What has been said with reference to illuminating nonsyn'unetrical characters disposed on opposite sides of a sign, such as shown in Figs. 1 and 3, may be taken to apply to the combination of characters on opposite sides of the forms shown in Figs. 6 and 7 and in fact, to all other single constructions and combinations of constructions of characters now in use, or

to which the a ply.

It will be obvious to those skilled in the art that the arrangement of the lamps and the plate 5, may be used with any of the conventional-types of sign characters now in use.

What is claimed as new is: I

principles of this invention may 1. In a live light electric sign, the com-- bination of a frame, a translucent plate con-- nected to and extending parallel with the said frame, said plate having a plural-ityof transparent portions arranged in such relation to each other as to define a desired sign character, and a plurality'of incandescent lamps connected to the frame and arranged in alinement with the transparent portions of the said plate.

2. A double faced electric sign including-a body with open sided frame constructions which form alining characters on the opposite faces thereof, areflecting plate connected to the body and interposed between opposite characters and having transparent portions in alinement with the registering sunken characters in the opposite face thereof and alining with the first-named characters, a plate interposed between opposite' characters and connected to the body, said plate having transparent portions and in candescent lamps connected to the body and disposed in alinement with" said transparent portions, and arranged so that lines drawn from their tips to their bases will extend in planes parallel with the adjacent surface of said plate.

4. A double faced electric sign including a body with open sided frame structures which form sunken characters on one face of the sign and extension characters on the oppo site face of the sign and in alinement with the first named characters,'a plate connected to the body and interposed between the said characters and having transparent portlons in alinement with the registering portions of said opposite characters, and incandescent lamps connected to a side wall of the sunken characters and arranged in alinement with the transparent portions of the plate.

5. A sign comprising a hollow body having oppositely disposed hollow characters a plate of translucent material interposed be 'tween said characters and having a transparent portion disposed in alinement with the alining portions of said characters, and an incandescent lampconnected to the body and disposed in alinement with the transparent portion of said plate.

6. A sign comprising a hollow body having oppositely disposed hollow characters a plate of translucent material interposed between said characters and having a plurality of spaced transparent portions disposed in alinement with the opposite alining portion of said characters and a plurality of incandescent lamps connected to the body and disposed in alinement with the transparent portions of the said plates.

In testimony whereof I afiix my signature in presence of two Witnesses.

JOSEPH o. WILLIAMS. 

